by Jaime Grijalba.
This year the Oscar race has had many turns and twists, as the video protagonized by Sam Juliano, Dennis Polifroni and (the not so) little Sammy repeated in its glorious 40 minutes of insight talk on upsets and predictions, I think it’s time as always to have our own chance to publicly put our own predictions, upsets or whatever bile we have to spew regarding the Oscars of this year. As in every year that I’ve had the idea to do this, I shall be putting the film that Will Win (my prediction) followed with my pick of who should win the prize, sometimes it will match… most of the time they won’t, but the reason here is to be opiniated and to appraise at the same time the other nominees in the categories. This year it’s also the first one where I’ve done my 10 Days of Oscar in english, a usual thing I do in the 10 days upcoming to the Oscar ceremony where I review every movie nominated for best picture. You can go to my site right now, there are a few movies left and a bunch of movies already reviewed that you can comment upon, two of the usual writers of Wonders in the Dark have guest posts there: Bob Clark and Sam Juliano. Anyway, without any further ado, here are the Oscar predictions and wants:
Best Picture
Who Will Win: Argo.
Who Should Win: Django Unchained.
Best Director
Who Will Win: Ang Lee, Life of Pi.
Who Should Win: Michael Haneke, Amour.
Best Actor
Who Will Win: Daniel Day Lewis, Lincoln.
Who Should Win: Joaquin Phoenix, The Master.
Best Actress
Who Will Win: Jennifer Lawrence, Silver Linings Playbook.
Who Should Win: Emmanuelle Riva, Amour.
Best Supporting Actor
Who Will Win: Tommy Lee Jones, Lincoln.
Who Should Win: Christoph Waltz, Django Unchained.
Best Supporting Actress
Who Will Win: Anne Hathaway, Les Misérables.
Who Should Win: Amy Adams, The Master.
Best Original Screenplay
Who Will/Should Win: Django Unchained.
Best Adapted Screenplay
Who Will Win: Lincoln.
Who Should Win: Argo.
Best Cinematography
Who Will Win: Life of Pi.
Who Should Win: Skyfall.
Best Editing
Who Will/Should Win: Argo.
Best Art Direction
Who Will Win: Anna Karenina.
Who Should Win: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.
Best Costume Design
Who Will Win: Anna Karenina.
Who Should Win: Lincoln.
Best Makeup
Who Will/Should Win: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.
Best Visual Effects
Who Will Win: Life of Pi.
Who Should Win: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.
Best Original Score
Who Will/Should Win: Life of Pi.
Best Original Song
Who Will/Should Win: ‘Skyfall’ for Skyfall by Adéle.
Best Foreign Language Film
Who Will/Should Win: Amour.
Best Animated Feature
Who Will Win: Wreck-It Ralph.
Best Documentary Feature
Who Will Win: Searching for Sugarman.
Best Sound Mixing
Who Will Win: Les Misérables.
Best Sound Editing
Who Will Win: Zero Dark Thirty.
Best Animated Short Film
Who Will Win: Head Over Heels.
Best Live Action Short Film
Who Will Win: Curfew.
Best Documentary Short Film
Who Will Win: Open Heart
Jaimie:
Few are saying now that Tony Kushner will win for LINCOLN, so your preferred choice of ARGO is almost certain to happen. Still, LINCOLN may do better than many think.
I agree with Day-Lewis and Hathaway winning as they are sure to, but am less certain about Best Actress and Best Supporting Actor. Like you I did call Riva, and I am hoping we both are right. She deserves it. Still, what is the ratio of “deserving” winners surfacing? Some do sure, but too often it does not.
Geez, CURFEW, eh? I am pulling for HENRY or DEATH OF A SHADOW, and think the former will actually do it. I love THE PAPERMAN best of the animated shorts and am calling it for the win.
I now agree with you on WRECK IT RALPH, which was quite good, though I slightly prefer FRANKENWEENIE. But I also call WRECK IT RALPH for the win.
Great work Jaimie!
Interesting list! Two counters, if I may:
1) I don’t think Ang Lee will win. I don’t think he’s even in the running. I don’t want to be “that guy,” but in 70+ years of Oscar history, only one non-white man has won the Best Director prize. And that was Lee, back in 2005. (If I’m wrong on that stat, please somebody point it out. I’d really like to be wrong about it.)
I suspect the award won’t go to him again in so short a time, regardless of his work or “Pi’s” actual merits. This is, in my mind, a complete crock. But the Academy is something of a political animal, well aware of the statements Oscar wins can make. They like to do themes. They like to send messages. I get the sense that once they deliver an award to a minority group, they feel less pressure to acknowledge them again for, say, another ten years or so (see also: Kathryn Bigelow).
For reasons stated elsewhere on the site (!), I think this one will go to Spielberg.
2) Tarantino has snagged the BAFTA, Globe, and Broadcast Critics awards this time around, but I will do a spit take if he gets another writing award. Especially for “Django,” which is looser and less disciplined than his previous efforts, and an enormous structural mess. QT could have used Roger Avary’s red pen here at the script level, and Sally Menke’s razor in the editing room.
It’s the dark horse at this point, because of an ugly and well timed smear, but I think the writing award will go to “Zero Dark Thirty.” Given the near perfect technical execution of Bigelow and her team, I can’t imagine that movie walking away from the evening with nothing (and saying that, I think this will be the only prize “ZDT” receives).
PS: I haven’t seen any of the nominated short films, but I laughed at what William Friedkin said when he allegedly voted for “Curfew”:
“Curfew is the least depressing of five films guaranteed to prevent you from getting laid, as I personally learned.”
it seems that it’s not Friedkin after all.
who is it?
Friedkin isn’t because he just tweeted saying that he doesn’t mask under anonimity
I’ll say only two things.
1. The original screenplay prize will, almost certainly, go to MICHEAL HANEKE for AMOUR (ZDT is a shut out, and I feel the Academy is getting alot of outside pressure to dump on it)… FASSBIN is absolutely correct on TARANTINO not getting it, though I found the screenplay sharper than he did…
2. LIFE OF PI is this years HUGO. It’s a film that received many nominations (second only to LINCOLN), is admired, but not loved, by the Academy. It will do well in the technical awards (I predict music, special effects and, possibly, cinematography) and nothing past that. On this point you can take my words to the bank.
Sorry, Jaime, but your adolescent, college film-student hero worship for the slick and cool DJANGO UNCHAINED (a film I happen to adore) is showing and only someone so young and inexperienced in understanding the Academies thinking would make calls, predictions and preferences like that. In a few years, as you mature more, you’ll see the difference between the slick and momentary satisfaction associated to films like the type Tarantino makes, and start embracing more lasting, penetrating works. I was like you in college and high school and I thought I’d always stand like cement in defending my convictions about art. However, as years wear on and maturity sets in I have seen my tastes change drastically (I can no longer stomach films like STAR WARS, which I thought were the second coming of Jesus Christ almighty when I was your age), though I keep a very youthful perspective at hand and i still do defend certain boy-crush directors, like Spielberg, to the end.
You tastes will change too and you’ll see a year like this reveal other films as your favorites as you grow.
The day I stop liking Tarantino films will be the day I kill myself.
I understand your deep feelings about film. If Emmanuelle Riva, who’s 86 and traveling all the way from France to attend the ceremonies, doesn’t win I think I’ll kill myself. Jennifer Lawrence is only 22, she’s lovely, talented and surely will have a long career and many Oscar nominations ahead of her. Give it to Riva.
‘Amour’ sweeps the Cesars!!!
Indeed Mark!
Best Picture
Best Director
Best Actor
Best Actress
Best Screenplay
HOLY MOTORS was up for most of those awards as well, but obviously lost on all counts.
And just a thought, the last time I had this sense of ‘this is going to win, no matter what predictions say’ was when last year I predicted best actress to go to Meryl Streep and not Viola Davis, so that’s that.
I’m willing to bet on that I’ll get more right than any of the people here.
Last year, excuse me, the surest money was on the idea that Streep would pull it in in the end and defeat Davis (as it did turn out). If you recall correctly, the flowering of Davis at the SAG saw some souring as the critics predicted that time was right for Streep to add another Oscar to her mantle after thirty odd years of being nominated and not winning. In the week prior to the Oscars the smart critics and prognosticators saw Spencer as the only sure shot for THE HELP and witnessed Streeps juggernaut take on massive proportions (neither Davis or Streep were my favorites, I prefered Rooney Mara for THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO). So, don’t start acting like you’re the ultimate Oscar guru here because you predicted what many already knew last year. As I, rightfully, predicted, DeJardienne, Streep, Spencer, THE ARTIST and Hazanivicius all took their prizes and none of the predictions I or Sam had made at the last minute (a few hours before the telecast) were difficult for anyone to see.
Sure, there is an unpredictability to these things that will see a wild card win sneak up, but to truly follow the odds and the predictions, the mulling over each category and know how the Academy thinks in their whacked out politics, is to state what obviousness there is to these things.
That said, I’ll rejoice if Tarantino takes the screenplay prize (I liked it far more than most here at WITD), but I wouldn’t hold my breath for too long. Does he deserve it beyond all the others nominated in that category? NO. That right is really reserved for Micheal Haneke that spoke so much truth in the end of life scenarios of AMOUR or the white knucked thrills of ZERO DARK THIRTY. If there is a true dark horse in the best Original screenplay category, my bet is that it’s Wes Anderson for MOONRISE KINGDOM. Often touted as one of the quirkiest and finest writers in modern comedy, he lost this same prize in 2002 for his wonderful THE ROYAL TENNENBAUMS and the Academy may be looking to make up for that slight….
In the end, Tarantino is NOT liked by the Academy, a point they made abundantly clear when his PULP FICTION was bested by FORREST GUMP in 1994 (a film not even remotely close to being as good as PULP), and as we all know you need to be liked somewhat by the Academy to garner positive and serious consideration (a fate that will befall Joaquin Phoenix this year-his performance in THE MASTER would have given Day Lewis a run for the money-but Phoenix’s shenanigans and bizarro behavior on the talk-show circuit, plus his public bashing of the Oscars-turned the screws against him and the Academy would never risk a flighty personality like his to possibly do something off-the-wall in an acceptance moment-to be blunt, Phoenix is dead in the water). Tarantino is considered a master of sensationalism, not serious cinema, by the Academy, and we all know that sensationalism rarely, if ever, Oscars in a big way.
I’ll cross my fingers for Tarantino and Waltz, but I fully expect Haneke and Jones or Hoffmann to take the prize in their categories. Like you, I had DJANGO on my top ten list, but only a fool would go as high as number 1 with it considering the flaws that DO plaque the film. It’s very good but nowhere near the best of the year. Again, it’s the “boy-crush” fanatacism of someone so young admiring a hero and the obsession with the film-school appreciation of ingenuity over substance that jades your opinion. Try feeling a bit and you’ll see where film can really take you.
The only films of the nine nominated for best picture this year that truly deserved the nominations were:
LIFE OF PI
AMOUR
ZERO DARK THIRTY
LES MISERABLES
LINCOLN
and that would have probably been the roster had the Academy stuck with the original, and better, number of films in the BEST PICTURE category…
A win for ARGO as BEST PICTURE would be the result from pressure by the outside group factions calling foul over the Academy stacking the deck for their favorite: Steven Spielberg and LINCOLN…
And those ARE the facts…
Oh yes, you read my mind, that’s the exact reason I liked Django Unchained, it’s just that, how have you read my mind?
HOW DOES YOU EVEN EXIST?
Anyway.snarky snark aside, I put Amour at the top of my list for the longest time before I saw Django, because it made me feel a lot, and I’m not afraid at all to feel, in fact, that’s what I look for when I see movies: feelings, and Django made me feel a lot, it made me happy, sad, giddy and excited, something that no other movie did in the year in its similar lengths, hence its placing. The Master is now number 3.
And how about this: “film-school appreciation of ingenuity over substance that jades your opinion.” Have you ever seen the movies that people that have come from my film school have made?
Oh, right, of course not, they are winning festivals around the world, of course you wouldn’t. They are winning not because of their ingenuity, oh no, we are taught that film is feelings and storytelling to the maximum degree (as well as a good cinematographer).
I remember the video in which you talk about ‘Les Miserables’, you and Sam asume that young bloggers (like me) don’t appreciate Opera nor musicals, and while that is true for the majority, not for me, I love listening and watching opera on my TV (specially since I can’t really afford tickets) and while I can’t even differentiate a piece from another I can listen and enjoy them, I’m not interested in being an expert now but I just love the format and the singing. My not-liking of Les Miserables isn’t either about a fear of feeling, but of a disgust towards the shooting style and the awful awful editing in the film, besides how much I hate the singing voice of Crowe, and other people of the cast.
If you were truly allowing feeling to play into the equation then DJANGO, a very slick film devoid of emotion, except where the feeling for his wife came in, would not have topped your list. I understand this, I went through the same sophmoric understanding of film when I went to school, but I grew and I appreciated as I grew.
As for LES MISERABLES… You really didn’t get it then because the emotion of the film was built on the daring use of close-up that Hooper employed, taking it away from a mere stage adaptation and turning it into a completely cinematic one.
Finally, don’t hit me with the “we’re film students and making movies” bullshit that makes you seem more privvied to knowledge about filmmaking than those that don’t make them. I’ve held a camera in my hand and went through all the same motions you did in school when I studied film. I understand the A-B-C’s of a films production and how one goes about extracting emotion from the work and the technique involved in making a film. However, making movies is NOT the final prerequisite to understanding them and being able to say whether or not a film is a failure or a success. If we went on your criteria then we would HAVE to say that half of DJANGO is a rollicking success and the other half is a messy, disjointed failure. Very few young film-makers hit their stride in the beginning and most of them have to wait till full human maturity and an understanding of life comes into play. The Spielberg of 1975 (JAWS) wasn’t half as mature as the Spielberg of 1993 (SCHINDLERS LIST) and he’s the most dynamic young director to hit the American film scene till Paul Thomas Anderson entered the field of sight…
Don’t get me wrong, I loved DJANGO, one of my personal favorites of the year… However, I’m too intelligent to quarrel a point that I cannot win when I know damned well that many of the criticisms of that film are well founded. I like DJANGO because I think it’s uproariously funny. It’s no great shakes as a well-made film and Tarantino’s influences are heavy and his style is borrowed more than created. It’s disjointed, messy, but I love it because it makes me laugh…
You wanna feel, then go rewatch AMOUR or LINCOLN or, for that matter, the deeply criticised SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK. Feeling in DJANGO? I’m not buying it…
I guess we just have different views on what feelings are. For me, if a movie moves me in any way, it has filled me with feelings, the feelings of happiness and excitement are important to me. Now, does that mean that every action movie is great because it fills me with thrills and excitement? No, because it’s a very narrow and enclosed group and a certain kind of action that entertains me, the kind that is well thought and in order, with a purpose and well shot, but whatever.
I would never go onto anyone with the excuse that I know better because I’ve made films (short films), specially since I can honestly say that since I know the production how-tos and the difficulties, I’ve been more Forgiving than more Exigent towards the movies I’ve seen, I know how hard it is to make one, that’s the main reason why I don’t like writing negative reviews and I’m really sad when I find bad movies in my radar, it’s a sad moment to me, because I know how hard it is and specially when you know people tried to make it as better as possible, and they just can’t.
What I was saying about the films of my film school was in response to the fact that you were saying that the film school had blinded me in some way into a fanatism for a particular aspect of filmmaking, the “ingenuity over substance” thing, I just was saying that my film school does not usually endorse the movies I like nor the ones I want to make, and I’m glad for that, I’ve forced my way into so I can do what I truly want, and that’s something that taught me: ingenuity is not an option, and substance is where its at. That’s all.
Maybe american Film schools need a rehash.
Besides, I think I’m old enough to know my taste and know what I like to do and the kind of things I want to have in my life, I’ve chosen a career and a set of films to like, may the future and the unknown past surprise me in a great way, but Tarantino is where I’m aiming when I say who I want to be,
Or Raul Ruiz…
Or Takashi Miike…
Or Jess Franco.
@dennis – I will be you a plate of mozarella sticks from the Boulevard that “Amour” will win nothing but Best Foreign Language Picture. ;)
BET. I meant to say ‘bet you’, haha.
Fassbin—
You may really have it figured here. Most ‘predictors’ are indeed sticking with AMOUR for Best Foreign Film only. You may well get those mozarella sticks!
PICTURE: ARGO
SHOULD WIN: THE MASTER (followed by, in descending order): Zero Dark Thirty, Compliance, Cloud Atlas, Damsels in Distress, Beasts of the Southern Wild, Take This Waltz, Silver Linings Playbook, Bernie
BEST NON-ENGLISH-LANGUAGE PICTURE: AMOUR
SHOULD WIN: ONCE UPON A TIME IN ANATOLIA (followed by, in descending order): Oslo August 31st, Amour, Footnote, Holy Motors, The Kid with a Bike, 5 Broken Cameras, Goodbye First Love
DOCUMENTARY FEATURE: SEARCHING FOR SUGAR MAN (Malik Bendjelloul)
SHOULD WIN: SEARCHING FOR SUGAR MAN (2nd: Player Hating: A Love Story (Maggie Hadleigh-West), followed by 5 Broken Cameras (Emad Burnat and Guy Davidi); The Invisible War (Kirby Dick); The Queen of Versailles (Lauren Greenfield); West of Memphis (Amy Berg)
DIRECTOR: Steven Spielberg, LINCOLN
SHOULD WIN: Nuri Bilge Ceylan, ONCE UPON A TIME IN ANATOLIA (2nd: Paul Thomas Anderson, The Master, followed by: Michael Haneke, Amour; Kathryn Bigelow, Zero Dark Thirty; Kenneth Lonergan, Margaret; Joachim Trier, Oslo August 31st)
ACTOR: Daniel Day-Lewis, LINCOLN
SHOULD WIN: Joaquin Phoenix, THE MASTER (2nd: Anders Danielsen Lie, Oslo August 31st, followed by: Philip Seymour Hoffman, The Master; Daniel Day-Lewis, Lincoln; Jean-Louis Trintignant, Amour; Jack Black, Bernie)
ACTRESS: Emannuelle Riva, AMOUR
SHOULD WIN: Ann Dowd, COMPLIANCE, followed by Jessica Chastain, Zero Dark Thirty; Emmanuelle Riva, Amour; Michelle Williams, Take This Waltz; Jennifer Lawrence, Silver Linings Playbook)
SUPPORTING ACTOR: Robert De Niro, THE SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK
SHOULD WIN: Matthew McConaughey, MAGIC MIKE (2nd: Samuel L. Jackson, Django Unchained, followed by: Robert De Niro, Silver Linings Playbook; Lior Ashkenazi, Footnote; Jim Broadbent, Cloud Atlas; Dwight Henry, Beasts of the Southern Wild)
SUPPORTING ACTRESS: Anne Hathaway, LES MISERABLES
SHOULD WIN: Amy Adams, THE MASTER, followed by: Helen Hunt, The Sessions; Rosemary DeWitt, Your Sister’s Sister; Anne Hathaway, The Dark Knight Rises)
ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY: Michael Haneke, AMOUR
SHOULD WIN: Paul Thomas Anderson, THE MASTER (2nd: Mark Boal, Zero Dark Thirty, followed by Craig Zobel, Compliance; Michael Haneke, Amour; Ebruy Ceylan, Nuri Bilge Ceylan and Ercan Kasal, Once Upon A Time In Anatolia; Kenneth Lonergan, Margaret)
ADAPTED SCREENPLAY: Chris Terrio, ARGO
SHOULD WIN: Joachim Trier and Eskil Vogt, OSLO AUGUST 31st (2nd: David O. Russell, Silver Linings Playbook, followed by Richard Linklater and Skip Hollandsworth, Bernie; Andy Wachowski, Lara Wachowski and Tom Tykwer, Cloud Atlas; Tony Kushner, Lincoln; Tracy Letts, Killer Joe)
CINEMATOGRAPHY: Roger Deakins, SKYFALL
SHOULD WIN: Mihai Malaimaire Jr., THE MASTER (2nd: Gokhan Tiriaki, Once Upon A Time in Anatolia, followed by: Roger Deakins, Skyfall; John Toll and Frank Griebe, Cloud Atlas; Robert Richardson, Django Unchained; Grieg Fraser, Zero Dark Thirty)
ART DIRECTION: ANNA KARININA
SHOULD WIN: CLOUD ATLAS followed by Anna Karinina, The Master, Moonrise Kingdom, Lincoln, Skyfall
COSTUME DESIGN: ANNA KARININA
SHOULD WIN: CLOUD ATLAS, followed by Moonrise Kingdom, The Master, Anna Karinina, Lincoln, Mirror Mirror
FILM EDITING: ARGO
SHOULD WIN: ZERO DARK THIRTY, followed by: Cloud Atlas, Argo, Compliance, The Master, Skyfall
SOUND MIXING: LES MISERABLES
SHOULD WIN: DJANGO UNCHAINED, followed by Zero Dark Thirty, The Master, The Avengers, Skyfall, Flight
SOUND EFFECTS EDITING: LIFE OF PI
SHOULD WIN: THE AVENGERS
SCORE: Michael Dynna, LIFE OF PI
SHOULD WIN: Johnny Greenwood, THE MASTER (2nd: Reinhold Heil, Johnny Klimek and Tom Tykwer, Cloud Atlas, followed by Heather McIntosh, Compliance; Benh Zeitlin and Dan Rohmer, Beasts of the Southern Wild; Mike Suozzo, Damsels in Distress; Alexandre Desplat, Moonrise Kingdom)
ORIGINAL SONG: Skyfall” from SKYFALL (music and lyrics by Adele and Paul Epworth
SHOULD WIN: “Looking for a Sign” from JEFF WHO LIVES AT HOME (music and lyrics by Beck Hansen) (2nd: “Metaphorical Blanket” from Any Day Now (music and lyrics by Rufus Wainwright); “Who Were We?” from Holy Motors (music by Neil Hannon, lyrics by Leos Carax and Neil Hannon); “Who Did That To You? from Django Unchained (music and lyrics by John Legend); “Before My Time” from Chasing Ice (music and lyrics by J. Ralph); “Anything Made of Paper” from West of Memphis (music and lyrics by Bill Carter and Ruth Ellsworth))
SPECIAL EFFECTS: LIFE OF PI
SHOULD WIN: CLOUD ATLAS followed by The Avengers, The Dark Knight Rises, Life of Pi, Prometheus, The Impossible
HAIR AND MAKEUP: LES MISERABLES
SHOULD WIN: HOLY MOTORS, followed by Lincoln, Cloud Atlas, Rock of Ages, Django Unchained, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
ANIMATED FEATURE: WRECK-IT RALPH
SHOULD WIN: WRECK-IT RALPH, followed by Frankenweenie, The Pirates: Band of Misfits
DOCUMENTARY SHORT: INNOCENTE
LIVE ACTION SHORT: BUZKASHI BOYS
ANIMATED SHORT: PAPERMAN
I’ve never heard protagonist used as a verb before. Apparently Spielberg is in development on a Freud biopic with Liam Neesom in the title role and Jennifer Lawrence playing his daughter Anna. Kind of like a time machine for Sam and Dennis, huh, isn’t it weird that you now know what you will be excitedly talking about in a diner in two years time?
Nice try Jason…